Missouri Department of Conservation has made changes to its managed bear season that will make it significantly easier to draw a tag. Missouri’s managed bear season has been producing less than ideal harvest reports the bear population has been booming for the better part of a decade with little help from hunters to curtail the growth. While MDC, and hunters should non the less celebrate the growth in bear population, it is important to manage the growth in order to reduce human and bear conflicts. In order to promote more harvest, MDC is increasing the harvest quota from 40 to 60 and is increasing the tag allocation from 600 to a whopping 2000. Increasing the harvest quota is in my opinion not going to have a huge impact. The quota hasn’t been reached in years prior. The tag allocation increase however will change bear hunting in the show me state quite a bit. With around 5000 applicants in past years, hunter’s odds of getting a tag increase from about 1 in 12 to better than 1 in 3. Now getting a bear tag in Missouri can be done as frequently as grabbing a managed deer hunt. If these changes will increase the bear harvest substantially enough to make an impact will only be told by time. If I had to guess I’d say we will see more bears harvested than last year’s 9, but how much more I can’t say.
Good luck to all the bear hunters in 2026!
MDC black bear digest 2026
Big Woods Outdoors 
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